Assuming a character or creature with very little speed – say, 15 feet. It gets hit with a ray of frost, reducing its speed to 5 feet. It is attempting to move through difficult terrain. Can the creature in question move through the difficult terrain without dashing?
[RPG] Can you move over difficult terrain with only 5 feet of movement
dnd-5emovementterrain
Related Solutions
A creature usually can't take a 5-foot step to enter a square that hampers the creature's movement
When determining the movement costs for hampered movement, the game usually doesn't care where the creature is and instead cares where the creature's going:
Difficult terrain, obstacles, and poor visibility can hamper movement (see Table: Hampered Movement for details). When movement is hampered, each square moved into usually counts as two squares, effectively reducing the distance that a character can cover in a move.
If more than one hampering condition applies, multiply all additional costs that apply. This is a specific exception to the normal rule for doubling.
In some situations, your movement may be so hampered that you don't have sufficient speed even to move 5 feet (1 square). In such a case, you may use a full-round action to move 5 feet (1 square) in any direction, even diagonally. Even though this looks like a 5-foot step, it's not, and thus it provokes attacks of opportunity normally. (You can't take advantage of this rule to move through impassable terrain or to move when all movement is prohibited to you.)
You can't run or charge through any square that would hamper your movement.
Emphasis—and extra emphasis—mine. Thus at issue is the creature's destination square not its current square. The creature's already in its current square, so the creature doesn't have to care about that square's terrain, having already overcome the difficulty of entering it!
For example, going from a square of supernatural darkness into an adjacent square of bright light is just normal movement, but going from a square of bright light into an adjacent square of supernatural darkness usually costs double movement due to poor visibility. In fact, going from any square into an adjacent square of supernatural darkness usually costs double movement due to poor visibility, the condition of the starting square typically not mattering at all.
Exiting then reentering the same square of hampering terrain still costs additional movement, of course. A creature can't move normally back and forth between squares of hampering terrain just because it's occupied the same square of hampering terrain previously. For example, moving from a square of supernatural darkness to a square of supernatural darkness then back to the original square of supernatural darkness does not speed up the return trip.
Where rules fail let logic prevail
Let's take a good look at the rules involved first, then we can use logic to intuit what to do with large creatures in difficult terrain.
The Rules say:
You move at half speed in difficult terrain—moving 1 foot in difficult terrain costs 2 feet of speed
(PHB 182)
Types of Difficult Terrain:
dense forests, deep swamps, rubble-filled ruins, steep mountains, and ice-covered ground—[are] all considered difficult terrain
(PHB 182)
The DMG adds webs(p105) and climbing on a larger creature(p.271) to this list. Also of note are ball bearings and caltrops (PHB , which do not create difficult terrain per se, but moving through a square full of either one at half movement (as if treating it as difficult terrain) negates the other effect of the these hazards. Then, there are spells that make an area into difficult terrain, but since there are a lot of these and they mainly mimic one of the aforementioned effects, I won't address them specifically.
Dense Forests: are hard to push through, cause you to have to weave around, snag on your clothes, etc.
Deep Swamps: are hard to push through, cause you to have to weave around, your feet get stuck in mud, etc.
Rubble-filled Ruins: cause you to have to weave around, may shift under your weight, etc.
Steep Mountains: require more energy to traverse, may cause you to have to backtrack or climb vertically, could trigger rockslides, etc.
Ice-covered Ground: walking slower helps you to avoid slipping and falling.
Webs: taking care by moving slowly helps you to not become stuck and restrained by the web.
Climbing on Larger Creatures: the constantly shifting, unpredictable surface hampers movement.
Ball Bearings and Caltrops: taking care by moving slowly lets you avoid stepping on something that you wish to avoid.
Some of these examples reduce movement because the creature moving has to be careful of a hazard (Rubble-filled Ruins, Ice, Webs, Ball Bearings and Caltrops), others reduce movement by actively impeding progress (Dense Forests and Deep Swamps), and others because traversing the terrain is physically more demanding (Deep Swamps and Steep Mountains).
What about Large Creatures
The most important thing to consider when handling a large creature moving through difficult terrain are:
Is the terrain still difficult at that size?
Normal stairs would be difficult for a Tiny creature, but wouldn't be for a Small or larger creature, similarly, some steep surfaces may not present a problem for a creature large enough to simply step up to the next level. Similarly, tall grass may seem like a Dense Forest to a Tiny creature, and a Dense Forest may seem like no more than tall grass to a sufficiently large creature. The depth of a swamp is also relative to the size of the creature traversing it. Things like slipperiness and avoiding hazards would still be a problem for most creatures, no matter how big they are.
How does the large creature move?
Is the size of the Hazard small enough for the large creature to simply bypass by stepping over it? If they don't notice it, would it potentially still impede their movement, such as making them slip or get stuck? In such a case, where it would, where are the creature's feet? For a bipedal creature, such as a troll, ogre, or giant, I would assume that their feet are near the center of the spot they occupy and treat them as triggering the hazardous terrain while the center of their space is within the effected area. For a quadruped, I would assume that their feet were at the corners of the square, and for a creature that slithers or has many legs, then they may either trigger the effect in their whole area they occupy, or negate it entirely, depending on the situation.
Using Percentages
Another good way to handle this is to roll Percentile Dice and if the number rolled is less than the percent of the creature's squares that occupy the hazardous terrain, then they treat it as difficult terrain, otherwise they don't.
This is the better way to do it when logic does not strictly suggest another solution.
Best Answer
Yes, normally - but not when using the Playing on a Grid variant rules
The basic rules say of difficult terrain:
The default presumption of the rules is not that you are playing using a combat grid. If a creature can only move two and a half feet in one turn, they still move two and a half feet; they don't have to snap to an arbitrary grid, they can still make progress moving.
However, the Playing on a Grid variant rules state:
Under these rules, a creature with only one square of movement available (because it has a movement speed of only 5ft) cannot move into a square of difficult terrain unless it Dashes (or otherwise gains extra movement), because it must have 2 squares of movement available to enter the space.
As a DM, I would probably let a creature in such circumstances move one square every other round rather than forcing them to use an action to Dash in order to make any progress. They're still considerably slowed, but they don't suffer any extra penalty compared to the default case of not using a grid.